Community of Madrid
From the Wikipedia page https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Community_of_Madrid The Community of Madrid (English: /məˈdrɪd/;1 Spanish: Comunidad de Madrid ðe maˈðɾið) is one of the seventeen autonomous communities of Spain. It is located in the centre of the Iberian Peninsula, and of the Castilian Central Plateau (Meseta Central). Its capital is the city of Madrid, which is also the capital of the country. The Community of Madrid is bounded to the south and east by Castilla–La Mancha and to the north and west by Castile and León. It was formally created in 1983, based on the limits of the province of Madrid, until then conventionally included in the historical region of New Castile. The Community of Madrid is the third most populous in Spain with 6, 549, 979 (2018) inhabitants mostly concentrated in the metropolitan area of Madrid.2 It is also the most densely populated autonomous community. Madrid's economy is of roughly equal size to Catalonia's, which remains Spain's largest. Institutions of government In the process whereby democracy was restored in Spain between 1975 and 1978, the nationalist and regionalist parties pressed to grant home rule to certain territories in Spain. The constitution of 1978 opened a legal way for autonomous communities to be formed from provinces with common historical and cultural links. Even though the province of Madrid belonged to the cultural and historical region of Castile, the other provinces refused to include Madrid in their autonomic developments and, finally, it was granted autonomy as a single-province community by means of the 144th article of the constitution which declared an exception to the aforementioned rule in the creation of autonomous communities if it was the "nation's interest." The Community of Madrid was created in 1982 after the elaboration of a Statute of Autonomy, later approved by the General Courts of Spain. All autonomous communities are organized politically within a parliamentary system; that is, the executive branch of government—known as "president" in the case of the Community of Madrid—is dependent on the direct support of the legislative power, whose members elect him by majority. The Statute of Autonomy of the Madrid Autonomous Community is the fundamental organic law in conjunction with the Spanish constitution. The Statute of Autonomy establishes that the government of the community is exercised through the Commonwealth of Madrid, formed by: *The Assembly of Madrid[ represents the people of Madrid and exercises the legislative power of the community in approving and supervising the budget and in coordinating and controlling the actions of the government. The seat of the Assembly is located in the district of Puente de Vallecas. The Assembly is integrated by 120 members elected through proportional representation with closed-party lists. *The President of the Community of Madrid is the supreme representative of the region and the ordinary representation of the State. It presides and heads the activities of the government of Madrid, designates and dismisses the vice-presidents and the counselors which conform an executive cabinet. The president is elected by the Assembly, appointed by the King and is usually the leader of the party or coalition with the absolute majority of seats in the Assembly. The seat of the Presidency is the Real Casa de Correos palace located at the Plaza of the Puerta del Sol at the center of Madrid.9 The office has long been held by the Partido Popular. From 2003 to 2012, the Community of Madrid was headed by Esperanza Aguirre, the first woman elected for that office. She resigned10 the 17th of September, ostensibly due to health and other personal reasons. She was succeeded by her right hand man, Ignacio González González. After the 2015 elections the President was Cristina Cifuentes, who resigned on 25 April 2018 after a fraudulently obtained MA degree and a shoplifting incident came to light. She was replaced by her deputy Ángel Garrido. *The government of Madrid, Government Council, is the collegiate institution that heads the politics and the executive and administrative powers of the community. Nowadays, the Board of Counselors (the Regional Executive Committee) comprises the President, the Deputy President, and nine Counselors. The Community of Madrid is organized territorially into 179 municipalities and 801 towns and entities. Its municipalities comprise 2.2% of Spanish territory (8110). It is ranked 23rd amongst Spanish provinces in number of municipalities, which is slightly above average. The average is 165 municipalities by province. Burgos has the largest number of municipalities with 371 municipalities, and Las Palmas the fewest with 34. See also: Assembly of Madrid, President of the Community of Madrid, and Government of the Community of Madrid'